>> welcome to al jazeera, america. i'm del walter, and these are the stories we're following for you. >> all you need to do is open the vote. >> congress still stalled over the budgets. set to take the boss' job. she's tapped to be the next federal reserve chairman soon. >> with all chemical weapon capability by midyear 2014. >> and the progress report on chemical weapons in syria.

>> pressure is still building on the white house and congress to end the deadlock of the debt ceiling and shutdown. president obama plans to sit down with republicans and this appears to be open to a short-term fix. this will give them longer time to find the long-certainly solution. we've been at this stand off for so long are we seeing any signs of progress. >> while all sides are talking about negotiating we're not seeing any fruits come from that yet. we're seeing a series of meetings this morning, house speaker john boehner and eric cantor met with the democratic side of the aisle. it is behind closed doors and we haven't heard what has been discussed. we're seeing the engagements

taking place. we're hearing a hard line from all parties involved including senate majority leader harry reid who spoke today. >> let's reopen the government. speaker boehner could end this shutdown today, an hour from now by letting the entire house vote on the senate's clean bill to reopen the government. when the speaker is on national tv and other places saying we don't have the votes, he will never know that because he won't let the major come to the floor. of course it has enough votes. let's reopen the government, pay our bills. there is no reason for republicans to drag out this process and force the nation's economy to edge ever closer to catastrophic default. >> reporter: now there was a rally on the government steps talking about reopening the government and getting some movement. the district of columbia, the

finances are very tied to the federal government. the two democratic bodies ended up coming to a conflict. we saw a private discussion there amongst the fray between senator harry reid and the mayor of d.c. vincent gray. as everyone watched like politico, the two had a moment where there seemed to be tension. the administration is saying democrats vote yes on this piecemeal bill that the house republicans have put forth that would fund us. this is adding to interesting conflicts and it's not all just democrats and republicans. >> speaker john boehner continues to stress that republicans are using the debt ceiling for political leverage, how is that playing out in the polls? >> reporter: we're watching to see how the american public is interpreting two things. both this march towards the debt ceiling but also the government shutdown. reuters has a poll out that

shows three-quarters of americans are concerned. that's up from last week. the question everyone is asking who do they blame? 30% say republicans are at fault. 19% say democrats are at fault. and this looming question of who the public would hold responsible if the u.s. breaches that debt ceiling, and that's a much more dire concern. one political point that is gaining a lot of steam is outrage that many americans have over the fact that people who have lost a loved one through fighting for america's wars are not getting benefits. there is this hold up in actually getting this money to them. so there is a bill in the house floor today that would try to at least get that forward. >> libby casey live on capitol hill. thank you very much. the government shutdown and debt cerealing are not the only items on president obama's agenda today. the president is sitting down with local news stations for

interviews including richmond virginia which happens to be home for eric cantor. what is the president trying to accomplish and are we looking at brink manship? it's all about stage craft and posturing. with so little moment and so little negotiation, everyone is trying to get a toe-old and read the tea leaves to see if this disaster is going to b averted in seven days not to mention the fact that the government is in its ninth day of shutdown. the president is staying on message. we've seen him use a number of venues providing pictures, trying to get his message out. he took a walk in the shine last friday. he's been to a construction site in maryland. he went to fema headquarters with an hour long press conference, all different venues, all partially kind to

get the media's attention to amplify what the president has said over and over again. you look at some of these markets that the president is granting interviews to today. they're eight minute interviews. the anchor comes in and the president says what they want to say, and bada bing bada boom, and there is no room for variance here. they count on the local stations to come in and play ball with the president, frankly, and this is how it has always worked. there is one d.c. station doing an interview. d.c. heavy with federal workers. concentrated in d.c. in large park who are futur furloughed. then in richmond, virginia, yes, eric cantor represents a portion of richmond, virginia, but so does scott ridgell who has a lot of military in his district. who has openly called for a clean vote. so this is the strategy. this is how the president and

the white house picks these markets. and the president consistently now trying to get that message out. you might call old wine-new bottle, but still it's the effective way to use the bully pulpit. >> thank you very much. and we continue to watch both washington and wall street. wall street right now continue to go react cautiously to the events in washington. the dow has been bouncing between gains and losses all session. although the nasdaq falling hard for a second straight day the dow as you can see up 13 points now. america's veterans could get hit hard by the shutdown. secretary of veteran's affairs testifying on capitol hill explaining what is at stake. >> if the shutdown does not i objected in the coming weeks v.a. will not be able to assure delivery of november checks to more than 1.58 million beneficiaries. that accounts for $6.25 billion in payments that people are

expecting. >> and as we mentioned in just a couple of hours, president obama is set to formerly nominate janet yellen as the federal reserve. >> reporter: the conventional wisdom was that this announcement was going to be made while so much more is going on. particularly with the debt ceiling situation, but there is no secret that it was going to be janet yellen. the rules are "r" that the vice chair becomes the chair automatically if someone isn't nominated or confirmed by the time the fed chair's term expires, which by the way in this case is the end of january. one way or another if president obama wanted it to be janet yellen, it was going to be janet yellen. yellen has served as the vice chair since 2010. she will succeed ben bernanke. bernanke's second term ends in

december. she was in a strange campaign battle versus larry summers. there has never been a campaign for fed chairs. most fed chairs, the public wouldn't know who they were before they were named. now, summers withdrew his name from consideration after a lot of opposition surfaced from senators. yell someone 67 years old. she will be the first woman ever to run the federal reserve. her appointment has to be confirmed by the senate. now the big challenge facing the current fed chair ben bernanke and janet yellen is to do with all this money the federal reserve has put into the economy. they will tape of off if they see unemployment down and economic growth a little stronger. that was expected to take place in september. it didn't. then we were thinking november.

certainly by the end of year. but this whole discussion of the debt ceiling has thrown everything into confusion because at this point if the debt cereal something breached on october 17th we will see a slowdown to the economy. so that's the mess that janet yellen is walking into. >> ali velshi with "real money with ali velshi." the president is expected to officially announce janet yellen's nomination. that will take place 3:00 p.m. eastern time and we'll cover that for you live. as we get closer to the nation's debt limit, fear is looming of what will happen if the nation is unable to pay it's billions. >> the default means its basically out of money. it means that you have maxed out your credit card but you still have bills to pay so you raise

your credit limit. how much do they spend? on thursday the united states brought in $110 billion. that's from things like taxes, farmers paying loans, customs fees. but also on that same day the treasury spent $143 billion. just from thursday. the united states is in the red $33 billion. so to pay those bills it borrows money. but we're about to hit america's credit limit. it iit is $16.6 trillion. and it can borrow no more than this. and the united states government means 1 trillion-dollar just to pay the bills. things like social security checks for retireries, military pay, money for local cities and schools. they could all be at risk in theory.

there is a huge impact on the economy that the value of the dollar could nose dive so items sold overseas are not worth as much. stocks, bonds, they all go down. folks who are trying to buy homes or cars are paying higher interest rates. some argue it may not be this bad. perhaps the treasury can pull off some accounting tricks and pay the things that really matter. overall the economists believe that a default could be felt globally and trigger the one worse than the one we just went through. >> inspectors in syria say they are making progress when it comes to destroying it's chemical weapons. but now they're calling for a temporary cease-fire for those inspectors to fulfill their mission. >> they're only beginning their work. it's been relatively safe where they have worked so far on sunday and on monday and again today. they visited another site. i think he's looking ahead and

making the point that this is going to be an extremely difficult job if the war is raging at full tilt, and they're going to be times and places where they are going to need help and cooperation from various armed forces if they are to do what they seek out to achieve, and what is after all a pretty tight timetable. let's just remind ourselves of exactly what essaying the obcw would like to happen in the coming weeks and months. he wants the syrian government to submit its timetable on the destruction of weapons, the templates of destruction by october 27th. then we hope that the opcw will sign off and agree on that timetable by november 15th. and of course the entire mission has to be completed by june 30, 2014. that's not just th the identifyg and destruction of syria's

chemical weapon stock pile. it's the verification, the certification, if you like, from this side that that destruction has actually taken place. that is very ambitious under the circumstances. >> up next on al jazeera america a new report with major implications for anyone who is looking to buy or refinance a home.

>> while the economy at home struggles a lot of those economies are looking overseas. small business owners in those countries, they're not rolling

out the welcome mat. they say their profits will suffer. we're in mexico city with more. >> welcome to mexico city's central market. it's the largest market in the world covering more than 300 hectares. every week this hotel owner comes to stock up on fresh groceries to serve his guest. he shops here instead of a supermarket for one reason. >> you can't beat these prices. if i stop in the neighborhood i live i pay up to four more times than what i pay here. i save a lot. >> the central market pediatricians a system of 300 neighborhood markets across the city. half of all feed purchases in mexico city are made at these markets. markets have been central to mexichotel's culture life.

that is depicted by a portrait by diego riviera. these markets are under threat by national and international. chains popping up over mexico. earlier the mexican court barred a city law that bars supermarkets from the neighborhoods. now the city is coming up with other ways to restrict the chains. making sure these markets continue to thrive is a way to protect the social dynamic in the city's neighborhoods. >> mexico's supermarket association would not speak to us but said that the city is trying to block the creation of new businesses. many have a sentimental tie to its markets. >> i don't ever want them to disappear. >> while the city struggles to limit the growth of supermarkets it's the country's current

sluggish economy that led to a slow down of store construction. the city hopes they'l still it't draw the business. and the city hopes it does that for decades to come. >> coming up next, the special led lights that will make your bike ride a little more coverful. cover colorful.

>> welcome back to al jazeera america. i'm del walters. here are your headlines. president obama plans to meet with democratic leaders today. he is blaming the republicans for holding the u.s. economy hostage. the republicans say they want to negotiate. it not only stops those who have family members who died in action from getting their death benefits. they say they'll fix that today. the announcement of janet

yellen as leader of the fed. that will be announced at 3:00 p.m. eastern. we'll bring that to you. in news conference say the head of the u.n. inspectors plan to visit 20 sites in syria in the next coming weeks. therthere is a new study tht says u.s. adults are falling behind in reading as well. >> reporter: adults in this literacy class are catching up with skills they'll need in the 21ster centuriy. they're not alone. the measured and compared reading skills, math skills and the ability to resolve problems. researchers found that the u.s. ranked below average in all three categories. in literacy the u.s. ranked

16th out of 24. twenty-first third from the bottom in math skills, and 17th in problem-solving using technology. along with basic reading and math participants were tested onlooking at mileage. if. >> reporter: the literacy director said these core abilities are necessary for jobs. >> in everything, every job is computerized in some way. of course, it's also going to affect their person lives because if you can't read you're not going to do e-mail. you aren't going to be able to read documents at work or even do thing around the computer. >> reporter: debra boyd at

lipscum university in tennessee. >> i think we're all realizing that some of the important literacy skills we need to encourage among our younger people and therefore in our adults is the ability to use what they read to draw conclusions, to support their thought processes, to actually read for the content and context and then be able to use that. >> reporter: u.s. education secretary arnie duncan agrees saying adult who is have trouble reading, doing math solving problems and using technology will find the doors in the 21st century closed to them. jonathan martin, al jazeera, nashville. [♪ music ] >> meteorologist: i'm meteorologist dave warren. a powerful storm will effect the northeast over the next few

days. the mid-atlantic states are seeing the storm develop, and you can see this spin here. that's a deep area of low pressure. a very strong storm. up ahead of that we see the rain spread north but most importantly the factor with the storm is the wind. high pressure to the north. low to the south. northeast wind, and that will pile the water up in the bays here along with the rain each high tide gets a little higher. we had the high tide along the atlantic and it looks like we'll have minor to moderate over the next several days. now the storm is not moving too much, but the rain is starting to spread north, so look at rain to develop around washington, d.c. the timing of this looks to be wednesday evening. overnight tonight heavy rain and then coming up through philadelphia and then new york wednesday and thursday. the storm is still well to the south so we're getting that northeast wind continuing, wind

and rain over the next few days. thursday, friday, saturday, the rain coming down in washington, d.c. might start later the farther north you go. but it will continue throughout the weekend by sunday and monday it will start to clear out. here are all the coastal flood advisories that are in affect. elsewhere the temperatures are warming up into the 80s. the dry weather in the midwest. a few showers out west but the temperatures are warming up in the midwest. >> thank you. wait until you see these bikes. expect to turn heads when go riding in one of these. a california confidential building a bicycle wheel with l.e.d. lights. the founder of monkey electric came up with lights to display different appearance. and this appear when riding as lower speeds. thanks for watching al jazeera. i'm del walters. "techknow" is next. and for news updates throughout the day, as always, go to our website at www.aljazeera.com. we'll be live at 3:00 with that

white house announcement of janet yellen.